Hill model for J&K

SANKARSHAN THAKUR

New Delhi, May 11: The centrally appointed Jammu and Kashmir interlocutor group has recommended cascading devolution of powers to the Jammu and Ladakh regions on the lines of the Gorkhaland Territorial Administration. The broad-brush implication of the proposal is the loosening of Srinagar’s hold on decision-making in all departments other than home and finance. Offering The Telegraph a sneak-peek into the bold points made in the 160-page report by the interlocutor group, sources said: “The motivation behind a radical decentralisation of intra-regional powers is that since Independence, the diversity of political aspirations in J&K has been completely ignored by Srinagar-centric thinking. “Differences in aspiration exist not merely in the Jammu and Ladakh regions but within these regions as well, it is necessary to address them. The report is an advocacy of these competing aspirations in the state and the GTA is a good model to work on.” The GTA agreement, the sources said, is annexed to the report. But while they recognised the need for correcting the “imbalance of power” between regions, the interlocutors — Dileep Padgaonkar, Radha Kumar and M.M. Ansari — held out against demands for trifurcating the state from sections in Jammu and Ladakh. Their key fear probably was that any division among the three regions would de facto develop communal contours and knock off even the pretence of Jammu and Kashmir being a composite entity. The report is set to be made public next week, seven months after it was submitted to home minister P. Chidambaram. Sources suggested that the Centre was keen on a public debate “in Kashmir and elsewhere” to build consensus on the course ahead. “The report is, of course, not binding on the government but before suggestions become part of the larger policy discourse it is best to have an open debate on what should and should not be done,” the sources said. “Nobody is under the illusion that we are going to have a resolution in Kashmir tomorrow.” It is no surprise the interlocutors shunned even the notion of secession — just as secessionists of the Hurriyat shunned the interlocutors — but they may also have fallen well short of addressing the autonomy or self-rule aspirations of Valley-based parties like the National Conference and the People’s Democratic Party which dominate the political discourse of the state. What has been offered them is more symbolic and corrective in nature, not radical or concrete. There is, for instance, no blanket return to the pre-1953 era of autonomy. One suggestion is that the state government could choose to go back to calling the chief minister “wazir-e-azam” — the equivalent of Prime Minister — but only in Urdu; in all English exchanges, the chief minister will continue to be called just that. The content of the recommendation is linguistic, not political. There is an accompanying suggestion that the word “temporary provisions” in relation to Jammu and Kashmir in Article 370 of the Constitution be replaced with “special provisions” to remove any apprehensions about the “permanence” of constitutional guarantees the state enjoys. The interlocutors recorded issues of misuse of political and military powers in Kashmir and the steady erosion of guarantees under Article 370 of the Constitution and are learnt to have recommended a series of confidence-building measures (CBMs). They do not, however, translate into any big-ticket concessions. On the controversial Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA), for example, the report recommends for a start that security matters should not become issues of public debate or political polarisation. That said, the interlocutors suggested that criteria should be laid down to enable withdrawal of the AFSPA from specified zones of peace. The armed forces have been rock-jawed in their opposition to lifting the AFSPA, phased or in blanket fashion. The interlocutors have taken a sharper view of the alleged misuse of the Public Safety Act (PSA) under which people can be held without trial for up to a year. As a means to building public confidence, they held that PSA should be used with greater care and caution and trials of PSA detainees should be fast-tracked.(TT)